During my teenage years, I struggled with a distorted body image and a sense of emptiness that I filled with food. I would overeat one day and then starve myself for days after in guilt. I thought of myself as a physical body and graded my happiness based on the number I saw on the scale. My mind and body were disconnected. I was truly empty.

Through yoga (which I teach and practice), therapy (which I graduated from), alternative medicine (holistic nutrition, meditation & acupuncture), and healthy living habits (exercise and good sleeping patterns), I found balance and gradually healed myself. I realized that my body was the carrier of my soul and that I needed to treat it with respect or I was always going to be unhappy. Something inside me told me that change was possible, and I listened.

While practicing Yoga, I would often feel glimpses of peace and quiet within. Slowly, I started to feel more present, only then, a huge transformation happened - I was able to see my potential as a happy, fulfilled adult, instead of as a number on the scale.

For the last 12 years of my life, Yoga has encouraged me to develop and grow as a person. I now accept myself with both my strengths and weaknesses and I feel more at ease and peaceful for doing so. Every day as I live my life, I make a choice, I choose to live life fully awake not as a zombie or in auto pilot. I’m writing this to share my thoughts and experience with you and I want to remind you that being present is only a choice away! But it is a choice you have to make.

I now feel that I’m on a mission, a few years ago I started to open up about my struggles with my body image and food. Instead of feeling embarrassed I started to embrace this as a learning and growing experience. I started to practice honesty, truthfulness. I would mention what I had gone trough and how I overcame it to women who came to my class. Then I would talk about my quest to empower women, to help them heal.

To my surprise, I found that the more I talked to my female sisters out there (in the US, South America or anywhere in the globe), the more I realized that almost every woman at one point of her life struggles with her body image. I was no longer alone and what is more is that life (through my work), was giving me the opportunity to empower women to look within, to claim their own power and start living their lives as fulfilled individuals without paying so much attention to what number showed up on the scale…

Wake up my dear sister, today is the day; don’t wait until Monday to start yet another diet that is in fashion. Start taking care of your body and mind today. Look at the food that you put in your body as something nourishing to your spirit. Eat with full awareness so you can start to determine which foods feel good when you eat them and which don’t. Reclaim your power; don’t ask your doctor if it’s ok to eat a bag of Oreos and a pint of ice cream, you already know the answer to that and the dull feeling after overeating. Please stop using food as a way to escape: face your fears, doubts, thoughts and choose to live life as an awake individual rather than in auto pilot and numb.

Claim your own power, practice moderation when it comes to foods that will rob you of a sense of well being. For example, I can’t live without chocolate or ice cream but when it comes to eating foods like these, I’ve trained myself to practice moderation (training me took almost 10 years). Have patience, allow yourself to be human. Perfection is only going to leave you frustrated and you’ll chase it forever ‘cause it doesn’t exist! Of course there are going to be days when you throw your moderation out the window, but know that you’ve made a conscious choice, let yourself be and re-gain your power as soon as you can.

Here, I share some helpful tips to help you reconnect with your soul and remember food’s role. Don’t eat in front of a TV, while driving, talking on the phone and with people that don’t make you feel good when you are around them. Remember, food’s role is to nourish your spirit, respect the beauty of having the opportunity to eat food, practice gratitude and eat the food as an offering to your dear spirit. You deserve to honor and treat yourself with respect. If you don’t, nobody will do it for you.

When you get a strong urge to overeat, challenge yourself with the urge. Are you about to eat out of anger, frustration, fear, etc? Wait! Don’t give in right away! Try to pause for a moment, become aware of your body and simply breathe. Feel the sensations of your inhales and the sensations of your exhales. Do you notice the breath is short? If so, without forcing anything, simply relax your body and mind, try to let go of thoughts and again simply breathe. Bringing the attention to the breath will help you naturally deepen it and it will clear the mind as this will have a focal point. Also, try writing about your feelings, take a bath, go for a brisk walk, put some music on and dance (even if you think it’s silly), play with your dog, do anything that makes you feel good. Try your best to wait 10 minutes before you give in to a strong urge to eat. If after 10 minutes the urge is still there, give in, but wait! Give in mindfully, take three breaths before you eat. Practice portion control, take a small bowl or plate and try your best to only eat one portion. Eat it slowly, chew it, and savor it. Feel what you are doing, fell that you are eating! Be present, be conscious, it’s only a choice away! You can do it if you choose to do it!

            Every day, as I practice being present, Yoga encourages me to continue this journey of self-discovery, of being awake. Yoga invites me to see my full potential. I can now face the misperceptions and fears in my mind that manifest as thoughts. Yoga gives me the courage I need to keep going forward when life turns upside down. It has truly helped me learn how to swim in the “ocean of life”, sometimes waves come with many ripples and sometimes it’s calm. Yoga holds a very special place deep in the core of my being: in my heart and soul. Each morning, when I wake up, I welcome the new day with a sense of empowerment, knowing that I have something so powerful as the practice and philosophy of Yoga to carry me through the day. Every day, I feel blessed and forever grateful I’m in this path. Now it’s time to give back! To help my sisters who struggle like I did. I’m not looking to fix you but rather to inspire and empower you. I’m here to remind you that you can. The choice to heal or not to heal is yours. Let me plant a seed of hope in your heart!